Early Posthumous Releases

COL, RB, War Heroes, Loose Ends, IOW, ITW and the Sound Track recording from the film Jimi Hendrix.

This is a grouping of the initial releases following Jimi Hendrix’s death in late 1970.

Included here amongst the obvious of Cry Of Love, Rainbow Bridge, War Heroes and Loose Ends are the two Live albums. One drawn from a single show whiles the other is a compilation. Included along with these six albums is the Sound Track recording from the film, Jimi Hendrix.

Clearly some hit the mark better than others. It is interesting to note that Cry Of Love along with Rainbow Bridge saw re-issue over forty years later. While most of the material from the “studio” albums had been included in two compilation records in the 1990’s, the re-issue of Rainbow Bridge and Cry Of Love was more than welcome as it is felt that these releases at least had a good balance of material that was / is well laid out. They were also not an attempt to produce something that was planned by Hendrix shortly prior to his death, simply a presentation of some material he had been working on to achieve a planned album at that time.

The live material included on In The West, drawn from four different dates is considered a “tour de force” by many. So it was with little surprise that this title also made reappearance forty plus years after the original release. It did though have a surprise for many, as despite the title and duplicated art work of the gatefold album, the actual content didn’t quite match up. As good a release as it certainly is it failed to live up to the original along with leaving buyers with the thought of, “What’s the point”! Either duplicate the record and re-issue or change the content and issue it under its own steam. This is all to say, the later issue(s) of this title is a different album, not altogether but enough to challenge the thinking behind it and question the release as a re-issue.

Later Isle Of Wight releases can be found on

Finally, the Film Sound Track Recording. Included here as this simply pre dates Alan Douglas’s tenure in charge of the catalogue.

* Note that with Track and Polydor releases some stamper detail is expressed as:
> = an upside down triangle in all stamped matrix detail for the Track Records and Polydor Records pressings while V is expressed as such.
% = a diamond
^ = A triangle

This title can also be found in box sets which can be found in the Studio section.

Picture run through: Polydor German issue, front / rear and label and Polydor Holland [German printed cover] front / rear, inner sleeve and label. Track Records brought a gatefold sleeve, front / rear / inner gatefold and label. Reprise tan label with front / rear and Reprise two tone [dynaflex] record club issue, front / rear, inner sleeve and label. The inner gatefold to these Reprise pressings remain the same across all the copies shown here and shown with the next copy. The Reprise Records white face promo shows front / rear / inner gatefold and label. Experience Hendrix / Legacy – Music re-issued this album in 2015, shown here are the initial US, EU front / rear inner gatefold to both and later EU colour vinyl which has the same cover as the standard black counterpart, shown here the different shrink-wrap sticker. Not forgetting the Barclay Records which like the Reprise Promo shows a release date of 1970.

Photograph run through: UK Reprise pressing, front / inner and rear plus label, with the following also a UK pressing with a Reprise label but clearly showing [on one label only] the Made In UK. Both have UK printers or packaging listed on the rear cover. Shown rear cover and label, barring the colour shade difference and slight print differences mentioned these covers are the same.

The following three Reprise Records US pressings are the same in the respect to the covers, so only one shown. One has a loss leader inner as does the promotional pressing while the Tan labels differ slightly as one shows a P in brackets similar to that shown on the white face promo’.

The white vinyl pressing from the EU, 2019 associated with FNAC or at least available through that outlet.

Picture run through: First up front, rear and label of a UK Polydor followed by the rear of a Reprise Records issue and both a standard initial label and a promo white face label. Finally a South American copy, Uruguay with the sleeve being of the poly / paper type.

Photo run through: Isle Of Wight initial release from 1971 front, rear and label. Later UK Polydor issues show a slight variant to the rear, shown. While initially the label appears to have remained the same, much later pressings carried a variant of the label, shown. Following these is a test pressing from Polydor, 1971 showing front, rear and label. Finally here we have a Japanese Polydor pressing showing front, back, inner gatefold, label and insert.